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U.S. Rep. Tom Cotton expected to announce challenge to U.S. Sen. Mark Pryor
First-term GOP congressman has scheduled a hometown event on August 6 to address his plans to challenge Pryor, the Democratic incumbent
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
LITTLE ROCK (CFP) — After just a single term in the U.S. House, Republican Tom Cotton is expected to announce his plans to challenge Democratic U.S. Senator Mark Pryor next week.
Cotton, 36, is hosting a barbecue in his hometown of Dardanelle on August 6. While his campaign is not officially saying the congressman will kick off his Senate bid at the event, local Arkansas media are citing sources saying Cotton has decided to challenge Pryor, who is seeking a third term.
Not waiting for Cotton formally announce, the Pryor camp came out guns blazing, saying Cotton “has put his own political career ahead of the people of Arkansas and sided with Washington insiders and special interests.”
“When the people of our state review Tom Cotton’s record, they won’t like what they see,” the campaign said in a statement.
U.S. Represenative Tom Cotton
Cotton has been widely expected to run against Pryor, who is seem as one of the most vulnerable Democratic Senate incumbents facing the voters in 2014. The race is considered pivotal for Republican hopes of wresting a Senate majority away from Democrats.
A graduate of Harvard Law School who served tours in Iraq and Afghanistan as a captain in the U.S. Army, Cotton returned to Arkansas in 2012 to seek the 4th District congressional seat, which takes in rural areas south, west and northwest of metro Little Rock.
With funding from the Club for Growth and other national conservative groups, he easily won the seat, taking almost 60 percent of the vote in the general election.
In a sign of how contentious his battle with Pryor is likely to be, outside groups have poured more than $1 million in advertising into the race a full 15 months before voters go to the polls. Pryor has already been up on television, and Cotton has more than $1 million banked for the race.
U.S. Senator Mark Pryor
Pryor, 50, is scion of a prominent Arkansas political family. His father, David Pryor, served as governor and spent 18 years in the Senate before retiring in 1979.
Six years ago, Republicans didn’t even field a candidate against Pryor. But this time around, the GOP smells blood in the water, particularly because of Pryor’s deciding vote in favor of Obamacare in 2009.
President Obama had a miserable showing in the Natural State in 2012, losing to Mitt Romney by nearly 24 points. In addition to Arkansas, Senate races in two other Southern states, Louisiana and North Carolina, feature Senate races in 2014 where Democratic incumbents are running in states Obama lost.
However, Pryor has broken with Obama and the left wing of his party on a number of issues that are likely to help his re-election effort back home. His is just one of four Senate Democrats who still oppose same-sex marriage and also voted against a bill that would have expanded background checks for gun purchases.
One issue Pryor is likely to raise in the race is Cotton’s vote against the farm bll in House, which was defeated in June after a rebellion by GOP backbenchers. He was the only Republican in the state’s congressional delegation to oppose the measure, which was supported by many Arkansas farm groups.
Cotton, who grew up on a farm in Yell County that his family still owns, has said he opposed the bill because it contained too little aid for farmers and too much funding for federal nutrition programs. He voted for a revised farm bill after the nutrition funding was stripped out.
Cotton’s decision to jump into the Senate race will open up the 4th District House seat, which is expected to draw a large number of candidates. On the Republican side, Lieutenant Gov. Mark Darr and State House Majority Leader Bruce Westerman have expressed interest. Among Democrats, State Senator Bruch Maloch and State Represenative Jeff Wardlaw have been looking at the race.
Bill Halter drops out of Arkansas governor’s race, leaving Democratic field clear for former Rep. Mike Ross
Halter, the former lieutenant governor, says he’s dropping out in the name of Democratic uniy.
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com Editor
LITTLE ROCK (CFP) — Arkansas Democrats have avoided a potentially divisive primary for governor in 2014, after former Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter announced he’s dropping out of the race and throwing his support to former U.S. Rep. Mike Ross.
The decision is good news for Democrats fighting to hold on to the governor’s mansion in an increasingly Republican state.
In a surprise announcement on July 29, Halter said he was dropping out to avoid a “divisive” primary against Ross and “to help unite the Democratic Party.” His decision came after second quarter fundraising numbers showed Ross outraising him by a staggering 20-to-1 margin.
Former Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter
In 2010, Halter challenged U.S. Senator Blanche Lincoln in a bruising and ultimately unsuccessful primary battle that contributed to her defeat in November by GOP challenger John Boozman.
Halter’s campaign was non-committal on reports that he will now run for the 2nd District U.S. House seat, held by Republican Rep. Tim Griffin. Democrats are eyeing the district, centered in metro Little Rock, because Griffin carried it with just 55 percent of the vote against an underfunded Democratic challenger in 2012.
Halter jumped into the governor’s race in January after Attorney General Dustin McDaniel, the Democratic frontrunner, pulled out after confessing to an extramarital affair. Ross, who had said he was leaving politics when he gave up his House seat in 2012, changed his mind and followed suit.
However, Halter’s short stint in the race could have a lasting impact by introducing the issue of abortion into the mix in a way that could present difficulty for Ross.
Former U.S. Rep. Mike Ross
To counter Halter’s support among Democrats who support legal abortion, Ross — who had a pro-life voting record as a member of Congress — moved left, saying he supported Gov. Mike Beebe’s vetoes of two bills passed by the Republican-controlled legislature that would have restricted abortion.
The Arkansas Republican Party, commenting on Halter’s withdrawal, emphasized Ross’s change of position, saying, “How long will it take political opportunist Mike Ross to flip flop again and pretend he never changed his positions on abortion and the Second Amendment?”
Republicans have a primary battle of their own to sort out. Former U.S. Rep. Asa Hutchinson is running against Little Rock businesman Curtis Coleman and state Rep. Debra Hobbs of Rogers.
Hutchinson, the former No. 2 man in the federal Deparment of Homeland Security, is the National Rifle Association’s point man for its school safety initiative, He is seen as the frontrunner, despite previously losing three statewide races for U.S. Senate, governor and attorney general.
Beebe, the popular Democratic incumbent, is term limited, giving Republicans a shot at taking the state’s top office. While Republicans control the legislature and Arkansas’ entire congressional delegation, Democrats hold six of the seven state constitutional offices.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell draws Tea Party-backed challenger in Kentucky GOP primary
Matt Bevin, a Louisville investment advisor, hopes to duplicate Rand Paul’s feat by knocking off Senate leader with Tea Party support.
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
FRANKFORT, Ky. (CFP) — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has drawn a Tea Party-backed rival in the 2014 Republican primary, dashing hopes that he might sail into the general election unopposed.
Kentucky Senate challenger Matt Bevin
Matt Bevin, 46, who is a partner in a Louisville investment firm, is expected to announce his candidacy July 24 at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort before kicking off a three-day tour of the commonwealth.
McConnell’s campaign was quick to strike back at news of Bevin’s impending Senate run. Campaign manager Jesse Benton dismissed his candidacy as a “nuisance,” despite recent public polling showing large numbers of Republican voters in Kentucky open to a candidate other than McConnell.
Tea Party activists unhappy with Republican incumbents have been searching for potential challengers in a number of Southern states, including South Carolina, Texas and Tennessee. But McConnell is the first sitting GOP senator in the region to actually draw a serious primary challenger.
In 2010, Rand Paul, backed by Tea Party groups, shocked the GOP establishment in Kentucky by beating Secretary of State Trey Grayson in the Senate primary. He went on to win the seat in November.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell
McConnell backed Grayson in that race. But once Paul got to the Senate, McConnell conspiciously cultivated Paul and his supporters. Among his moves was hiring Benton, who was not only Paul’s campaign manager but is married to his niece.
Paul has since endorsed McConnell for re-election, dashing the hopes of Tea Partiers who want to get rid of the top Republican in the Senate.
A group of 15 Kentucky Tea Party groups released a letter July 22 blasting what they called McConnell’s “progressive liberal voting record, his absolute iron fisted rule over the Republican Party in Kentucky and his willingness to roll over and cede power to President Obama and the liberals in Washington.”
If McConnell makes it through the primary, he will face Democratic Secretarty of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, who, at just 34, is nearly 40 years younger than the 71-year-old McConnell.
Grimes won her post in 2011 with 60 percent of the vote, the best performance by a Democrat in any statewide race. However, McConnell’s campaign has already started a drumbeat tying Grimes to President Obama, who lost Kentucky by 23 points in 2012.
McConnell has already raised more than $9 million for the race, giving him a substantial advantage over both Bevin and Grimes.
Arkansas Senate race awash in money 15 months out
Senator Mark Pryor and his expected challenger, Congressman Tom Cotton, are raising millions, while outside groups pour money with abandon into Arkansas.
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
LITTLE ROCK (CFP) — More than 15 months before a single vote is cast for the U.S. Senate — indeed, before Arkansans even know for sure who will be running — outside groups from both sides of the political aisle have already dumped more than $1 million in ads onto TV viewers across the Natural State.
This spending wave is even more striking considering that Arkansas is the second-smallest Southern state, with fewer than 3 million people, and has only two major television markets.
Senator Mark Pryor
Incumbent Senator Mark Pryor, considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the 2014 election cycle, raised $1.2 million in the second quarter of 2013, with nearly $4 million in the bank, according to figures filed with the Federal Election Commission.
However, Pryor has already had to go up on TV to counter a negative ad from New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s group Mayors Against Illegal Guns, which poured $350,000 into Arkansas earlier this year.
Bloomberg’s spots lambasted Pryor for his vote against President Obama’s call for expanded background checks for gun purchases. In his reponse, Pryor said he was defending the Second Amendment against a proposal that wouldn’t have prevented any of the recent mass shootings.
All told, Pryor spent $700,000 in the second quarter, or nearly 60 percent of what he managed to raise during that period.
Representative Tom Cotton
Meanwhile, the man considered to Pryor’s likely GOP opponent, Representative Tom Cotton of Dardanelle, raised $611,000 during the second quarter and now has slightly more than $1 million in the bank.
Cotton, an Iraq war veteran in just his first term in the House, has been playing coy about whether he’ll give up his safe 4th District seat to challenge Pryor. He says he won’t make an annoucement on his plans until after the August congressional recess.
But national Democratic groups clearly think Cotton will run. In a pre-emptive strike, two outside liberal groups, Patriot Majority USA and the Senate Majority PAC, pummeled Cotton with $308,000 worth of TV attacks earlier this summer.
So far, Cotton has not felt the need to rebut those spots with ads of his own.
Another member of the state’s congressional delegation, Representative Steve Womack of Rogers, has said he, too, might run against Pryor. In the second quarter, Womack raised $123,000 with $600,000 on hand, putting him well behind Cotton.
A GOP primary is considered unlikely. Womack, who has been in the House since 2011, is not expected to make the Senate race if Cotton runs.
Pryor, scion of one of Arkansas’ most prominent political families, barely faced opposition when he ran for a second term in 2008. But Republicans are smelling blood in the water this time around, largely because of the senator’s vote in favor of Obamacare in 2009.
Obama is deeply unpopular in Arkansas, losing the state by 23 points in 2012.
Two outside conservative groups, the Club for Growth and Senate Conservatives Action, have already spent more than $500,000 in negative ads against Pryor.
The Club for Growth was one of Cotton’s major financial backers in his successful House race in 2012.
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott enters 2014 race for governor
Abbott highlights his fights against Obamacare and gun control but avoids immigration.
(See announcement video below)
♦By Rich Shumate, Chickenfriedpolitics.com editor
SAN ANTONIO (CFP) — Republican Attorney General Greg Abbott has officially entered the race to be the next governor of Texas, launching his 2014 campaign by highlighting his fights against what he sees as infringements on constitutional freedoms and the overweening hand of the federal government.
“I didn’t invent the phrase ‘Don’t Mess with Texas,” but I have applied it more than anyone else,” says Abbott, who has sued the federal government 27 times during his three terms as state attorney general. “When it comes to our freedom and our future, I will never, never stop fighting. That why I’m asking you, the people of Texas, to elect me governor.”
Abbott, 55, made his announcement July 14 before a crowd of supporters in San Antonio, 29 years to the day since a freak accident left him paralyzed and in a wheelchair.
Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott enters 2014 governor’s race
“On a steamy summer day like this, I went out for a jog. While I was jogging, a huge oak tree suddenly crashed down on me,” says Abbott. “Doctors inserted two steel rods up and down my vertebrae … Some politicians talk about having a spine of steel. I actually have one.”
Abbott’s speech touched on familiar conservative themes, such as his legal battles against Obamacare and gun control and his successful defense of a Ten Commandments display at the State Capitol in Austin.
However, in his kickoff speech, Abbott, whose wife is Hispanic, didn’t mention an issue near and dear to the nativist wing of his party – immigration. Noting the blending of Latino and white cultures in the Lone Star State, he said, “Dos casas, pero una fundacion. (“Two houses, but one foundation.)
Abbott’s campaign Web site also steers clear of the issue, although it does note his work to combat human trafficking across the U.S.-Mexican border.
Republicans in Texas — where Latinos make up nearly 40 percent of the population — have steered clear of the more strident anti-immigration sentiment seen in GOP circles in other states.
Current Gov. Rick Perry was assailed as too soft on the immigration issue during his 2012 presidential run, although he has since come out against a compromise immigration bill that recently passed the U.S. Senate. Former President George W. Bush, Perry’s predecessor in Austin, supports the Senate bill.
Abbott is considered the prohibitive front-runner in the governor’s race, having raised Texas-sized campaign stash of more than $22 million. Perry’s decision not to seek a fourth full term as the state’s chief executive cleared away the largest obstacle in Abbott’s path.
Tom Pauken, a former state GOP chairman and state workforce commissioner from Port Aransas, is opposing Abbott. Debra Medina, a Ron Paul acolyte from Wharton who ran a spirited primary campaign against Perry in 2010, had also considered the race but is now running for state comptroller.
Pauken has characterized the race against Abbott as a “battle for the soul of the Republican party,” pitting big-money interests and Austin insiders against what he called the “Reaganesque grassroots.” He has challenged Abbott to a series of Lincoln/Douglas-style debates across the state.
On the Democratic side, State Sen. Wendy Davis of Fort Worth, who became the heroine of the abortion movement by successfully filibustering an anti-abortion bill in June 2013, is running. However, both San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro and former Houston Mayor Bill White, who lost to Perry in 2010, decided not to run.
A Democrat has not won the Texas governorship since Ann Richards did it in 1990. She lost to Bush four years later, which marked the beginning of a GOP tidal wave in state politics.
All nine executive officials elected statewide in Texas are Republicans, as are all nine elected members of the state Supreme Court.
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